Chapter 1

"Everything I said, have you remembered it all?"

Finally snapping out of his trance, Xia De looked at everything before him, feeling somewhat bewildered. The last second of his memory was spent helping a close friend handle funeral arrangements; the next second, he had arrived here.

This was a bedroom... definitely not a bedroom from the 21st century. The dim yellow light in the room wasn't very strong, the slightly darkened wooden floor was still fairly clean, but the walls had already yellowed somewhat. A stack of books was piled in the corner, crooked as if about to fall, and on the bookshelf beside the stack sat some metal pots, picture frames, and similar ornaments.

Those photographs were all in black and white.

Besides oil paintings, there were two metal pipes on the wall. One could vaguely see that the joints connecting the pipes were already somewhat rusted, and one of the thinner pipes branched off toward the desk. The brown wooden desk was covered in sheets of paper, and the drawers on both sides were half-open, revealing the files and papers inside.

On the desk, the desk lamp connected to the brass-colored pipe was still glowing, and the style of the heavy lamp's flared opening was very novel—

"Hm? Not an electric lamp? A gas lamp?"

It was difficult to distinguish whether it was a gas lamp just by observing, but the pipes clinging to the wall, as well as the wall lamps connected to them, didn't look like electric lights in any way. The warm yellow glow wasn't bright, only able to illuminate the area of the desk, but it inexplicably made Xia De feel a sense of warmth.

By this light, he saw the decorative oil painting on the wall, saw the black-and-white individual photograph on the desk, and saw the newspaper spread out in the shadows of the floor. He couldn't see any of the content on the newspaper clearly, but he could see that what was on it wasn't square characters, but letters.

This sense of an era—no matter where this place was, it was no longer his hometown.

The air was permeated with a kind of rotten smell, but it was more like the smell of a funeral home. Xia De remembered this smell; after all, just a moment ago, he was still helping a friend who had unfortunately passed away...

"Everything I said, have you remembered it all?"

That voice sounded again, and only then did Xia De completely wake up from his trance. The young man reacted quickly, feeling that someone was gripping his right wrist. Only now that his consciousness and body had completely merged did he think to lower his head.

He was standing by the bed in what appeared to be a man's bedroom from the 19th century. The bed was a four-poster bed, but only three sides were hung with curtains. The bed frame and the visible parts of the headboard all shimmered with a metallic luster under the gas lamp at the head of the bed.

The bedside lamp was in the shape of a little angel holding it up, and Xia De was attracted by this exquisite design for a moment.

The person holding his hand was the man lying on the bed. This middle-aged man, who was likely the owner of the bedroom, was wearing dark plaid pajamas and was hidden entirely under the quilt except for his head and right hand.

He had a distinct Caucasian face, but his eyes were sunken, his cheeks were drooping, and the right hand gripping Xia De's wrist was frighteningly thin. He looked exactly like someone about to be starved to death, and Xia De even believed that if he spoke a little too loudly, he would have to beg the man not to die.

Xia De didn't know anything right now and needed to understand the situation from this man.

"So... this is a transmigration?"

He thought to himself, considering he had a rough understanding of the current situation.

Fortunately, although the man on the bed was weak, at least there were no lividity spots on his body. Otherwise, Xia De would really have to worry about his current predicament.

"Everything I said, have you remembered it all?"

The weak man on the bed asked for the third time, his brown eyes deep in their sockets, yet staring fixedly at Xia De. Although Xia De didn't understand why he had inexplicably transmigrated here, at least he knew that it was best to keep acting for now, at least to understand the current situation before making plans for the future.

He opened his mouth to speak, only then realizing that the other party was not speaking Chinese, nor any language he understood, yet Xia De could inexplicably understand it. He wanted to answer in the other party's language, but he opened his mouth slightly; he could understand it but couldn't speak it at all.

"No way? Can understand it but can't speak it?"

For a moment, a buzzing sound appeared in his ears, and his back itched from nervousness. Not being able to speak the language of the residents of this other world was not something he could have anticipated; this was the worst-case scenario.

A buzzing sound appeared in his head, and he immediately realized that this sound was not caused by his nervousness at all. He understood the voice in his head; it was a woman, a woman speaking, and it was a whispering sound:

【The Sixth Era, General Calendar 1853, Summer, Day of the Silver Moon's Shine, you have arrived in this dark world. You understand that you need an identity, so you must inherit everything of this inexplicable body. Now is the first step: go and prove it, prove that you can enter this world.】

"Sys..."

His instinctive reaction was that this was the legendary system, but he immediately realized that this was definitely not a system.

The woman's voice was exceptionally elegant and soothing, as if she were reciting poetry in a whisper, making one intoxicated by it. But the language she used was different from Chinese and different from the language of the weak man on the bed.

That language was more ancient, more profound, as if it were a breeze from an ancient era that had crossed the curtain of time and suddenly blown into the present. The language itself was a materialized mystery; even just understanding the meaning of the language made Xia De feel as if he had seen the deepest darkness.

Although Xia De understood this second language, just understanding this language itself made his head buzz, and the stomach of his new body also reacted with nausea.

This was a sense of mental oppression; the language used by the voice in his head possessed extraordinary power.

"This is the language family of this world! The thing in my head is not a system; this is something that already existed in the original body!"

Xia De made a judgment, and as his pupils shrank slightly, he produced an even more terrifying guess from what he saw before him:

"The new world, this world suspected to be the Victorian steam era, is a world where the supernatural and the mysterious exist!"

He was not the type of person who couldn't accept the status quo. Since transmigration had already occurred, the existence of the supernatural was not entirely unacceptable. It was just that his first task now was to figure out the current situation, answer the man's question, and figure out his own identity.

Therefore, Xia De tried his best to convey information to the voice in his head using his own language:

"No matter who you are, please listen carefully. I want to accept everything about this body, but I don't have the memories of this body, nor the language habits of this body."

【Now, you have them.】

It was as if a brick had been forcibly stuffed into the top of his skull and maliciously stirred a few times. Xia De thought it was a miracle that he hadn't fainted.

He didn't gain the memories of the original body, but was forcibly stuffed with some knowledge—knowledge about the "Northern Kingdom Human Common Language, Delarion Kingdom Language." But this knowledge just existed, like a translator; he couldn't immediately master it and understand all the slang, dialects, religious culture, allusions, or language habits.

"Sorry, sir, I'm not feeling very well. Could you repeat the things you want me to remember?"

Relying on this knowledge, he intermittently translated Chinese into the "Northern Human Common Language" of the other world in his head, and then deliberately spoke it with a translated accent. The weak man gripping Xia De's hand suddenly exerted force; it was hard to imagine that such a thin wrist could have such power:

"You're still like this, your head isn't very good... Alright, I'll say it again..."

It seemed the original owner of the body wasn't very bright, so Xia De's words didn't arouse suspicion for the time being.

"Shade..."

The pronunciation of the name was very similar.

"I am going to die. I knew three months in advance that I was going to die, so I chose you from among the homeless. I changed your life, gave you a new name, let you learn to read simply, and understand some common sense. And after I die, you will get everything of mine—my detective agency, all my property. But you need to do one thing for me, a very simple thing—"

Although his tone was very weak, his terrifying eyes stared at Xia De like a dying lone wolf. The great terror revealed in his eyes made the outsider, who knew nothing about this world, feel a bit cold in his heart.

But Xia De kept his breathing as steady as possible, yet he didn't bravely look him in the eye. It wasn't that Xia De was afraid at this moment, but that from that sentence just now, he had initially understood the situation of the original owner of the body.

Therefore, at this time, he absolutely shouldn't look the man in the eye, but should fearfully shift his gaze away; only this would fit the known character setting.

"Inherit my detective agency. No matter what you want to use this place for, at least keep it operating. Until September 5, 1853, three months from now, you will receive a letter. Take the letter back and burn it. This is the price for you to obtain all my inheritance."

His hand gripped Xia De's hand tightly. Even though Xia De acted according to his acting skills, pretending to struggle slightly, he didn't think he could break free at all; the other party's strength was really great:

"This is the only request I, Sparrow Hamilton, have for leaving my inheritance to you, Shade Hamilton."